\documentclass{article}     \usepackage{multicol}
 \textheight15cm \textwidth8cm \parindent0mm \parskip 1ex plus2ex minus0.8ex
\begin{document}
\section*{8. Math Mode Accents: \newline
          \protect\normalsize (shown with the letter  ``a''  as an example)}

\begin{multicols}{2}
$\hat{a}  $ \verb|:\hat{a}|\\ 
$\check{a}$ \verb|:\check{a}|\\ 
$\breve{a}$ \verb|:\breve{a}|\\ 
$\acute{a}$ \verb|:\acute{a}|\\ 
$\grave{a}$ \verb|:\grave{a}|\\ 
$\tilde{a}$ \verb|:\tilde{a}|\\ 
$\bar{a}  $ \verb|:\bar{a}|\\ 
$\vec{a}  $ \verb|:\vec{a}|\\ 
$\dot{a}  $ \verb|:\dot{a}|\\ 
$\ddot{a} $ \verb|:\ddot{a}|
\end{multicols}

\end{document}
